Blank Editions

About

Blank Editions is a small recordings house based in Hackney, London. Set up during the winter of 2011 by designer David Santiago Blanco and publisher Will Shutes, The Blank Editions imprint situates itself within a local community of artists in order to edition recordings and other ephemera that documents and illustrates our immediate landscape.Within The Blank Editions imprint you will find three sub catalogues:

The Solo Series - Limited edition 7's in handmade packaging from local artists who normally play in bands

The Blank Tapes - Mini albums, Extended plays and experimental work from local associates. These editions are released on cassette tape.

The Blank Community - An open ended series to service more official work by local bands and artists.

New Releases

Thurston Moore - Chelsea’s Kiss b/w Sad Saturday

1. Chelsea's Kiss 2. Sad Saturday

Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore and Brooklyn-based drummer Ryan Sawyer along with UK-based members of Thurston Moore Group: bass player Deb Googe (also of My Bloody Valentine) and guitarist James Sedwards (also of Nøught) met up in the studio to record these songs offered here to support the campaign to FREE CHELSEA MANNING.

Partial proceeds of the sales of this cassette will support the Chelsea Manning Support Network (chelseamanning.org), and will be earmarked for the defence of Army Pvt. Chelsea (formerly Bradley) Manning.

Former Private Manning was sentenced to thirty years in military prison for sharing the video of a US helicopter attack that killed a dozen Iraqis, exposing US State Dept. cables, the "Iraq War Logs", and the "Afghan War Diaries" with the WikiLeaks website.

Mind-bending new release from Film Director and Founding Member of The Jesus and Mary Chain, Douglas Hart.

Following on from his sold-out debut 7” which we released in 2013, Douglas Hart returns to Blank Editions with a new 12” EP consisting of 21 minutes of new material.

Written and recorded at Utopia Studios in Primrose Hill between film shoot dates, the new EP utilises a more layered approach than the 7”. Four new instrumentals expand on the sound found on the debut.

Co-produced by Syd Kemp, the release is pressed on 180-gram heavyweight vinyl, and is housed in a 2-tone sleeve alongside 2 stamped envelopes with inserts and a download code.

Bruised Skies

We were introduced to Matthew Heywood and his
Bruised Skies project through our friend and regular
collaborator, Tim Garratt (Moon Zero, The Moriaki Skyway)

'Guide' is layered, visual music that captures a melancholic
isolated landscape perfectly like an ocean of sound lapping
against the shores of a mysterious fog engulfed island, guiding
the listener in and around its coastline, uncluttered and
effortless, yet never abrasive or self-indulgent.

It would be very easy to compare ‘Guide’ to a film
soundtrack, one that would not be out of place during the
most profound moments of Andrei Tarkovsky’s Stalker or
a dreamlike sequence in a David Lynch film. It is beautifully
dark, bleak and isolated in its journey throughout. After
repeated listens, it becomes startlingly apparent that there
is more to Heywood’s work than mere stereotyping.

Available for the first time in physical format and beautifully
hand-packaged, ‘Guide’ is subtly realised and
unrelentingly breathtaking for its 43 minute duration.

The Purge is the debut album from London composer and multi-instrumentalist, Ben Vince.

This is a pre-order item and starts shipping in early April 2016

The debut album from London composer and multi-instrumentalist, Ben Vince.

We were introduced to Ben Vince and his work through our mutual friends in Housewives who Ben had met at Goldsmiths Art College in London several years ago.

The debut recordings found on The Purge are layered inTenor Saxophone melodies and drone which serve as foundations that constantly evolve, turn and loop.

The entire recording pulses with warmth and soul as jazz-inflected motifs and signatures create a launching pad for experimentation that contain a post-punk familiarity yet a maturity that is not often on display in debut recordings.

Recorded and produced by Ben Vince and mastered by John Linger from Neils Children, The Purge has been applauded by Charles Hayward and label mates, Housewives.

Apostille - Virile Strain Transmission
The 8th entry into The Blank Tapes series

Shipping now direct from our store.

Virile Strain Transmission is the new cassette only E.P from our friend Apostille, the recording name for the solo work of Night School instigator Michael Kasparis and follows on from 2015’s debut album ‘Powerless’.

Here is what Michael had to say about the release.

“Virile Strain Transmission was an attempt to erase the contagion of doubt from “apostille’s” psychic apparatus, by magnifying each element. It was also an attempt to pull apart the practices which had become ingrained: once you learn something it becomes a crutch, A means to support yourself in unknown terrain.

I was interested in being in unknown terrain without a crutch, up shit creek paddle-less. Learning tricks of the trade builds up your resistance to change, but eventually doubt breaks the surface, makes you question what you’re doing. Doubts have no mercy. They’re always there, sometimes buried, sometimes a full-blown rash.

Virile Strain Transmission was an attempt to learn by unlearning, to explore all the doubts I had, blow them out of proportion, examine them and be without mercy.

Housewives to release debut album ‘Work’ in November.

Following on from the debut 7" we released earlier this year, we are happy to announce that Work, the debut album by Housewives, will be released in November.

Since forming in 2013, Housewives have built up a strong following playing with fierce originality and a constant sense of experimentation that is quickly making them one of the most respected bands on the UK underground scene today.

They have drawn praise from The Quietus, James Endeacott, Thurston Moore and have featured on Tom Ravenscroft's BBC6 music radio show. They are regularly championed by Post-Punk luminary Charles Hayward, who describes their sound as ‘A sort of monochromatic surliness slowly warming up to a barely controlled anger, hypnotic and building from the simplest elements’.

Work was recorded and produced with the help of Alex Townend (Vision Fortune) on a remote farm in the French countryside. Using de-tuned and home-made guitars basic song structures were formed and then added to with recordings made using found objects; machinery, agricultural equipment and construction materials intermingled with field recordings of the surrounding area.

An electric fence from from the surrounding farmer's land prevented a clean signal to the amplifiers resulting in no guitar or bass parts being recorded at the farm. The focus of the recording process was turned towards creating layers of percussive and instrumental parts; drum parts were recorded from the bottom of a disused silage tank (Autarky), church bells recorded from the closest village (Half Step) and the architecture of the farm captured by creating feedback loops from the ambient sound of the surrounding farm buildings (Fig. 1).

These compositions along with the remaining instrumental parts were assembled and finalised in Townend’s South East London studio.

Pre-orders are being accepted now
Starts shipping in November.

Work is released in partnership with Hands In The Dark and Negative Days. Edition of 500 copies.

TOMAGA to re-release familiar obstacles on vinyl.

After completely selling out of the cassette version earlier this year, we are pleased to present familiar
obstacles in vinyl format.

London based duo TOMAGA present 'familiar obstacles', a sprawling assemblage of over thirty
compositions that channel the more diverse elements of their multifaceted sound world into a feverishly
divergent blend.

If their debut album 'Futura Grotesk' is the wakeful thought form, familiar obstacles is the unconscious
interzone, evoking numerous shades of their musical hinterland; the results fusing studio experiment,
field recording, and tonal spectrum into something that by turns resembles musique concrete, imaginary
soundtrack and library music.

Pre-orders are being accepted now
Starts shipping on or around the 27th October 2015

familiar obstacles is released in partnership with Hands In The Dark and Negative Days. Edition of 600 copies.

HOUSEWIVES join Blank Editions

We are thrilled to announce that HOUSEWIVES from South East London will release their debut 7" New Dance b/w Time She Stopped through us in June 2015.

Following on from last year’s Faux Discx self-titled cassette-only E.P. Housewives join our new catalogue ‘The Blank Community’ to deliver two tracks of brutalist post-punk.

Opener ‘New Dance’ is 1 minute and 33 seconds of sonic assault that
brings to mind the nervous marriage of disco and no-wave pioneered by
the New York scene of 135 Grand Street, while Side B’s ‘Time She Stopped’ flaunts a degenerative collapse of all things resembling structure as the volatile dismantling of the record pulses out to a close.

This edition of 300 7” handnumbered copies is presented in a reverseboard cover, includes a collector’s insert which is housed in a stamped envelope and contains a download code.

The aforementioned new sub catalogue, The Blank Community, will run alongside The Solo Series and The Blank Tapes especially for bands and collaborators to issue recordings through Blank Editions.

Housewives vinyl package to include

Handnumbered reverseboard card covers Stamped envelope

Collector’s insert

Limited edition 7"

Download code

Pre - orders are being accepted at this time

Edition of 300 only.

The Solo Series

In 2012 we launched The Solo Series.
A collection of 7” vinyl only records housed in individually made handmade sleeves and editioned in small runs by associates from the local area who contribute or have contributed to some of our favoutite acts.

Charles Boyer - Ducks bw/ You Haven’t Got A Chance 7”

001 This was our very first release.
We kicked off The Solo Series back in 2012 with some phenomenal odd pop from Electricity In Our Homes’ own Charles Boyer.

This is the record that eventually formed Charlie's current Repertoire, The Voyeurs.

Joseph Coward - Children’s Bones b/w Fat & Ugly 7”

002 Our friend Samir Eskanda, who played in Flats and now in Charlie Boyers full blown band The Voyeurs, presented us with a couple of fresh recordings by Joseph Coward who he was managing. We had seen Joseph play in the past and were blow away at how engaging he was as a performer but also how well written his songs were. We were excited to put these recordings out as a very limited 7".

003 Founding member of The Jesus and Mary Chain and award
winning music video and film director Douglas Hart joins The Solo Series with two original compositions co - produced with Toby Kidd at Sleepwalker studios, London.

Douglas had shared a studio in Soho with David several years ago were both parties would waste hours talking about records and films, eventually the talk of Douglas contributing a couple of recordings for The Solo Series
came up and Toby Kidd was brought in again to co-produce the affair.

Ted Milton / Blurt - Let Them Be bw /Midi Dans Le Midi

004 Ted Milton is known as the primary song writer and creative force behind Blurt. He is also the only remaining original member since their 1979 formation in Stroud, Gloucestershire.

The seven-inch single is the latest release in a long history that includes a series of singles on Factory records and sharing the stage with Joy Division, Cabaret Voltaire, and A Certain Ratio.

Following the tradition of previous entries in the ongoing Solo Series, this limited edition single arrives in a card sleeve that is stamped, hand numbered and finished with a special insert that is linked to the video for the A side.

PRESSING DETAIL

Thurston Moore - Detonation bw/ Germs Burn

005 Founding member of Sonic Youth and Chelsea Light Moving, Thurston Moore joins The Solo Series with two original compositions paying homage to N16 London and international communicatzian actions.

Thurston moved into our neighborhood and attended the launch of the Douglas Hart 7" we did in May of the same year in London, at the event we asked him if he would be interested in contributing to the solo series.

PRESSING DETAIL

Yuki Tsujii - I'm Rubbish But I Love You

006 Bo Ningen are an act on regular rotation at our office
and we had wanted to work with the members for a while.
When our good friend Edgar Smith from Niqab introduced us
to guitarist Yuki Tsujii we were delighted to hear that Yuki already
had a stock of recordings that were pretty much ready for release.

“I‘m Rubbish But I Love You” was the recording chosen for the 7”,
The composition is a piece written and performed by Yuki as a gift
to his mother who resides in his homeland of Japan.

The piece was recorded by fellow Bo Ningen member Taigen Kawabe
and mixed by both parties.

We were excited to put these recordings out as a very limited 7".

PRESSING DETAIL

Edition of 300
5 test pressings 300 on black vinyl with light brown and black printed labels
300 gsm printed inner sleeve that is stamped and numbered
Printed tracing paper outer sleeve
Collectors' insert
Leaf taken from local parks in Hackney inserted into each record

Released in June 2014

The Blank Tapes

The Blank Tapes hope to provide an informal space for development and
experimentation, creating a platform for our associates to issue audio sessions normally not available to the general public.

The Blank Tapes series are released in Risograph printed j card sleeves in very small numbers making these collectors editions very hard to find after their initial release.

[ ] [ ] - War Room

These songs were recorded in Bonnie Carr’s lounge at the Chronos Building in Whitechapel, E1 in 2006.

Inspired by some amazing local musicians, like EIOH drummer Paul Linger, Neils Children frontman John Linger and fellow EIOH bandmate Charlie Boyer, these songs represent a raw response to Whitechapel itself and the city's geographical lure.

Niqab - Great White Overlord

The songs on side A were written towards the end of last year and recorded by the band in November in Cable Street Studios where they rehearse.

They were mixed in December and the surrounding good will and great advertising may have influenced their glossy commercial sound. The songs are about timeless experiences and feelings: being young and living for today, chip shop dinners, going out and having the best night of your life (and the morning after!) then doing it all again and again and again.

The band reconvened late in February to record
the B side. To contrast with the tighter or more conventional song structures on the first side, they jammed freely for an afternoon and then, aided by Logic and a Fostex M80, went back over the material, cutting-up, rearranging and splicing it with field recordings. These include a recording of band members being made redundant in January and a subsequent trip to Marrakech.

POSTPAID PRICES Cassette Tape
£4.50 UK £6.75 Europe £7.50 World

Neils Children - Serial Music # 1

TBT001 - 10 Tracks - 22 Minutes
'Serial Music # 1' is the new cassette-only mini album from Neils Children.

This work represents a side of the band never before heard, concentrating on purely instrumental pieces and atmospheric mood music. Recorded live in the band’s studio in Hackney, London, this collection represents a more personal and intimate view of Neils Children.

Influenced by library music and soundtracks, ambient soundscapes and field recordings, ' Serial Music # 1' isn't a follow-up to the group’s 2013 album 'Dimly Lit', rather it runs alongside it. Incorporating the album's atmospheric interludes and improvised sections the music could be, to borrow a cliche, a soundtrack to an unimagined film or the backdrop to a nocturnal journey... Either way, 'Serial Music # 1' offers a glimpse of the band behind the band.

POSTPAID PRICES Cassette Tape
£4.50 UK £6.75 Europe £7.50 World

COP - Title TBA

Close of Play/Crime or Punishment/Coven of Pricks
formed on August 25, 2012 when Neil Armstrong died. 18 months of relative inactivity later, the band’s first physical release came in the form of a track
on Malicious Telecommunications‘ Another Subculture tape to help raise funds for the DIY Space for London project.

One month later COP began practising under its current line-up and played their first show in March 2014 as part of the Challenging Behavior weekend. The next week the band recorded these songs for their first release proper on Blank Editions.

Financed by a redundancy payment COP are about to launch Unwork Records, a label born of the Unwork/Fuck-up Force nights that the band begun in October 2012.

POSTPAID PRICES Cassette Tape
£4.50 UK £6.75 Europe £7.50 World

Thurston Moore - Rosetta

Inspired by the comet-chaser Rosetta presently orbiting an epic journey to 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko, Sonic Youth founder Thurston Moore sings to the spacecraft "you were born to catch her light / and revel in her flight / before she goes too far / to unnamed stars / into deepest solar reaches / past all she has
yet to teach us...." with heavenly accompaniment by Hush Arbors on guitar, Samara Lubelski on ethereal violin and Sunburned Hand of the Man's John Moloney on drums.

This original seven minute and twenty second song is a rare treat from this group recorded to honour Sun Ra on
the occasion of his Earth-birth centennial.

POSTPAID PRICES Cassette Tape
£5.00 UK £7.50 Europe £8.25 World

TOMAGA - familiar obstacles

TBT006 - 2 Tracks - 53 Minutes
Our neighbours TOMAGA join us with a 52 minute and 34 second opus which acts as the 6th entry to The Blank Tapes series..

London based duo TOMAGA present 'familiar obstacles', a sprawling assemblage of over thirty compositions that channel the more diverse elements of their multifaceted sound world into a feverishly divergent blend.

If Futura Grotesk is the wakeful thought form, familiar obstacles is the unconscious interzone, evoking numerous shades of their musical hinterland; the results fusing studio experiment, field recording, and tonal spectrum into something that by turns resembles musique concrete, imaginary soundtrack and library music.

Charcoal Owls - Coventry Campbell

The Coventry Campbell, a kitchen sink homage to the now defunct Coventry Campbell pub, is the duo’s fourth release (preceded by two tapes and one full-length vinyl album, Tin Roof on
Night School Records).

Apostille - Virile Strain Transmission

TBT008 - 7 Tracks - 31 Minutes

Virile Strain Transmission is the new cassette only E.P from our friend Apostille, the recording name for the solo work of Night School instigator Michael Kasparis and follows on from 2015’s debut album ‘Powerless’.

“Virile Strain Transmission was an attempt to erase
the contagion of doubt from “apostille’s” psychic apparatus, by magnifying each element. It was also an attempt to pull apart the practices which had become ingrained: once you learn something it becomes a crutch, a means to support yourself in unknown terrain.

I was interested in being in unknown terrain without a crutch, up shit creek paddle-less. Learning tricks of the trade builds up your resistance to change, but eventually doubt breaks the surface, makes you
you’re doing. Doubts have no mercy. sometimes buried, sometimes a full-blown rash.

Virile Strain Transmission was an attempt to learn by unlearning, to explore all the doubts I out of proportion, examine them and be without mercy

Thanks to Blank Editions for giving me the chance”

The Blank Community

In 2015 we launched The Blank Community. A third catalogue that will release more official work by bands and artists.

Housewives - New Dance 7”

TBC001 - New Dance b/w Time She Stopped

Following on from last year’s Faux Discx self-titled cassette-only E.P, Housewives join our new catalogue ‘The Blank Community’ to deliver two tracks of brutalist post-punk.

Opener ‘New Dance’ is 1 minute and 33 seconds of sonic assault that brings to mind the nervous marriage of disco and no-wave pioneered by the New York scene of 135 Grand Street, while Side B’s ‘Time She Stopped’ flaunts a degenerative collapse of all things resembling structure as the volatile dismantling of the record pulses out to a close.

TOMAGA - familiar obstacles LP

TBC002 - 50 mins

After completely selling out of the cassette version earlier this year, we released familiar obstacles in vinyl format.

London based duo TOMAGA present 'familiar obstacles', a sprawling assemblage of over thirty compositions that channel the more diverse elements of their multifaceted sound world into a feverishly divergent blend.

Released in partnership with Hands In The Dark and Negative Days.

Housewives - Work LP

TBC003 - 11 tracks

Work is the debut album by London based Housewives.

Work was recorded and produced with the help of Alex Townend (Vision Fortune) on a remote farm in the French countryside.Using de-tuned and home-made guitars basic song structures were formed and then added to with recordings made using found objects; machinery, agricultural equipment and construction materials intermingled with field recordings of the surrounding area.